GROUP FROM SLOVENIA: Dear Guruji, when I was born, my youth was spent when all Slovenia was part of all other republics from Yugoslavia. We were raised in belongingness and brotherhood, but now, after independence that belongingness is lost and we are facing a lot of crime, increase in corruption and we do are trust ing each other anymore. Is this something that comes along with democracy? Or where did we make a mistake? What did we do wrong? How can we change it?

GURUDEV SRI SRI RAVI SHANKAR: You know this question could be a very good debate point for all the intellectuals in the society. You have to consider people from all different aspects or parts of society and start a debate on it - where did we go wrong? What is it that we are lacking? Where did we miss that sense of belongingness? How can we reinstate that? This will be a very useful debate. I don’t have a readymade answer for it. One thing I could say is that democracy cannot be blamed for it, no! Democracy is good. Democracy, in fact, should promote more sense of belongingness. Maybe we need to look into values. Here again, stress and mistrust could form a big part of the lack of these values in society. So, you need to really start a debate on it right away. Include women in it, senior citizens, youth (youth should become part of any debate from the start because they will see it from another perspective), social workers, and politicians. Everyone should sit together and think where did we go wrong? It’s good to promote human values in society; it helps us recharge our society with more trust and sense of belongingness. Education in human values, spiritual values amongst youth, would help them a lot.